So Mikhail Gorbachev est mort

The Press is falling over themselves to talk about what a guy he was, and how the Soviet system was (in the WaPo's term) "a seven-decade experiment born of Utopian idealism". Well OK then.  Remember, I did not read Pasternak but I condemn him ...

Oh, and the cartoon at that last link?  The one with two Gulag prisoners working in the snow and with the caption that said I won the Nobel Prize in Literature.  What was your crime?  You know, the cartoon that won a Pulitzer Prize?

Yeah, the WaPo would never publish it today.  Scratch a journalist, find a commie.

And so, here's a (err) toast to Mikhail Gorbachev, from back in the day when truth could still be spoken.

Dad Joke CCXXVII - special Lego edition

Did you hear about the Lego truck that crashed on the highway?   The authorities are still trying to piece everything together.

The Theodosian Walls of Constantinople in Lego

 This intersects my love of Lego and my Roman history Nerd.  Go check it out here.

Dad Joke CCXXVI

 I met a lady yesterday that has opened a small business selling batteries near the playground in the city park.

.

.

That's right, she sells C cells by the seesaw.

Music to unclench your fists

Sitting quietly, doing nothing,
Spring comes and the grass grows all by itself.

- Zen poet Matsuo Basho 

Aesop has a must-read post (riffing off of Francis Porretto) about refusing to pay attention to the panic porn:

UN. PLUG.

You'll add years to your life, and you won't spend most of them in abject fear and dread.

And so here's a Sunday Classical piece to help you unplug.  Relax.  The world will be here tomorrow but today the grass grows all by itself.

I also like the picture Aesop has.  It says this:

turn off the news.

go outside.

breathe.

you were never meant to carry the burden of the entire world.

The grass grows by itself.  It's said that plants grow better when you play music for them.  So turn up the music.

And make peace with God
And make peace with yourself, 
'Cause in the end there's nobody else

Have a great Sunday.  The World will be here tomorrow and tomorrow is time enough for that.

The best argument in favor if a Taurus Judge

Dragon's Breath .410 Flame Thrower shotshells. Now I always considered the Judge to be a bit gimmicky, and these incendiary shotshells seemed that way, too - until I watched this video and saw a unique application for property defense come the End Times:

So you put some gasoline in some metal bottles (Bud Lite, anyone?) and hit it up with one of these rounds.  It seems to me that this would be pretty effective against groups looking to loot your place.  Spread the bottles around where you expect two legged varmints to congregate.

This is a very specific use case for what otherwise seemed gimmicky.  The downside is that these rounds look like they're $5 per round (ouch!).  Still, it's a use case that seems hard to get any other way.

Thoughts?  Weirdly, this seems to be illegal in Florida and Alaska, as well as the Usual Blue States.  What's up with FL and AK?

Dad Joke CCXXV

Which animal is least interesting?

A boar. 

Security news

Not exactly a Security Smorgasbord post, but interesting and important stuff.

Lawrence has an post about a new sort of phishing scam pretending to be a Paypal invoice for a Walmart purchase.

There’s a new phishing scam making the rounds. I’ve received examples of this one twice myself over the last week, and since it’s a lot more sophisticated and polished than the average email phishing scam, I think it’s worth taking a look at.

You should go read - this is important.

Twitter's ex-Chief of security says that the company is entirely uninteresting in knowing just how many bots make up the Twitter user population.  What makes this really big security news is that the ex-Chief is none other than Mudge, one of the original L0pht guys.  He has big, big stature in the security community.  I don't know how this will play out, but this will be enormously damaging to Twitter's share price.  But it's hard to see this Justice Department go after the Twitter execs who helped the Democrats so much over the last few years.  

The Metaverse sucks, and you cannot have any privacy there.  I expect you already know that.

Sumd00d hacks his Hyundai car to change the smart screen software.  What uber 31337 'sploit does he use to find Hyundai's secret encryption key?  Google.  For realz.  Angels and Ministers of Graqce defend us.

Dad Joke CCXXIV

An Englishman, a Frenchman, a Spaniard, and a German were out for a walk when they stopped to watch a street performer juggle some balls.  The performer noticed the four men had a bad view from where they were in the crowd, so he climbed on a wooden box and shouted "Can you all see me now?"

"Yes."

"Oui."

"Si."

"Ja." 

Let the little children come to me

Well, let one particular little child come to Big Country:

He's posted a lot about his grand daughter and his fight to get her to safety.  Click here to donate to the Legal Fund.

Hector Berlioz - Dream of a Witches' Sabbath from Symphonie fantastique

I was raised in the Episcopal church.  It's been getting weird for decades and now seems to have pitched over the edge into the abyss of - dare we say it? - heresy: The Episcopal Church comes out in support of sex changes at all ages.

Sigh.

I don't know what a Chalcedonian christian can do these days.  I won't attend the Witches' Sabbath at the Episcopal church, that's for sure.  Although Hector Berlioz wrote some great music that would be appropriate for their so-called "mass".

 

Quote of the Day: Surf Rock edition

QOTD goes to commenter Matthew W in yesterday's post about The Ventures playing with their original drummer who had become a four star general in the intervening 4 decades.  His comment:

I like to tell people that I'm the lead singer in a Ventures tribute band...............

 Matt, The Internets you just won can be picked up at the Castle Borepatch drawbridge.  Use the usual password.

Incitatus for Consul

 Glen Filthie made an impassioned plea for Incitatus in the next election. Besides casting aspersions that Odin had bought my vote and my support, Glen Filthie's argument has some merit. Incitatus was a horse that was made a priest and a Consul around 37 A.D.. In today's configuration, I would think that would make Incitatus the Sec. of State or the Vice-President.

I would suggest some living horse, perhaps the winner of the next Belmont Stakes, but I await Glen's next comment to see if he was set on Incitatus even though the horse has been dead for over 1900 years.

When The Ventures played surf rock with an Air Force four star general

The Ventures are an interesting band. They're the most successful rock band in Japanese history (and that's not shabby, as Japan has bought more records than any country but the USA).  They're in the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame.  They have a Grammy.  Sadly, a lot of them are dead.  Interestingly for a rock band, the cause of death was mostly old age.

But their first drummer was when they were in High School.  George Babbitt was a drummer in the marching band, and joined them when they recorded this song, their very first hit.  Then he graduated and joined the Air Force.  Thirty-odd years later, he was a four star general.  When they played a gig for the Air Force, they asked him to sit in on drums.  He obliged, in full uniform.

This was 38 or 39 years after his days in the band, when he was Commander, Air Force Material Command (COMAFMC).  GEN Babbitt retired two years after this concert.  He seems to still be alive at the ripe old age of 80.

This post was inspired by one over at American Digest, which has a different (and more surf) song by the band.

Mmmmm ... that's some tasty mockery

Via Western Rifle Shooters, commentary on CDC's statement that they need to do a re-org to "do better":

 

Odin 2024

 I want our blog out front on this. We need effective leaders.

Well that was a real squeeker

Cheney got 70% of the vote in 2020.
 

Word

 

Via Some It's Just As Well, who has some interesting commentary.

I did not know that

Derek Ward posts a link that sort of undermines the whole "Florida is the Gunshine State" narrative: 

However, when you take into account the total population of both states, this gives Texas 21 gun stores per 100,000 people and only gives Florida 13.4 gun stores per 100,000 people. For comparison, most states on this list have well over 20 gun stores per 100k people.

C'mon, Florida - those are rookie numbers. 

On the converse side of things, Kentucky currently ranks the highest in terms of the total number of firearms purchased overall with the Bluegrass State purchasing more guns in the first half of 2022 than any other state in the union (a grand total of 2,094,787 firearms in the first 6 months).

Even ignoring the "Eastern Kentucky vs. Eastern Florida" mismatch, Kentucky is buying three times as many guns as Florida is.  Rookie numbers, indeed.

Dad Joke CCXXIII

Why didn't the Teddy Bear get dessert? 

Because he was stuffed.